Monetary Amount of Accrued Vacation Need Not Be Included on Wage Statements

As California employers are increasingly aware, California has a unique law requiring employee wage statements (pay stubs) to include specific items of information. Failure to include all such information, completely and accurately, exposes an employer to substantial penalties. The plaintiffs' employment bar has of course seized on the opportunity to profit off of this law because of the automatic right of a prevailing plaintiff to recover attorneys' fees. Claims alleging inaccurate and incomplete wage statements and seeking penalties on behalf of all aggrieved employees under PAGA have been filed in droves. One such lawsuit was filed against Motel 6, alleging that this employer violated California wage statement law by failing to include the monetary amount of employee's accrued vacation on their pay stubs. Yesterday, a California Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal of this claim, ruling that California law does not require the monetary amount of accrued vacation time to be included on employees' pay stubs (unless and until the accrued vacation time is paid out on termination of employment).

The court rejected the plaintiff's argument that because accrued vacation/PTO is considered a form of "wages" in California and wage statement law requires that gross wages and net wages earned during the pay period be itemized on the pay stub, this means that the monetary amount of vacation "wages" earned during the pay period must be itemized on the pay stub. Rejecting this argument, the court reasoned that an employee does not have any entitlement to be paid the value of accrued vacation until termination of employment and, as such, until termination of employment accrued vacation is just a benefit and not a wage earned during the pay period that must be itemized on an employee's pay stub.

While this case had the right result, it serves as a reminder of the crazy degree to which plaintiffs' attorneys are stretching to "find" wage statement violations and sue employers based thereon. If employers have not done so already, they should review their wage statements for strict compliance with the itemization reqirements set forth in California Labor Code section 226.

About CDF

For over 20 years, CDF has distinguished itself as one of the top employment, labor and immigration firms in California, representing employers in single-plaintiff and class action lawsuits and advising employers on related legal compliance and risk avoidance. We cover the state, with five locations from Sacramento to San Diego.

About the Editor

Robin Largent has a regular presence in California state and federal courts and has been lead defense counsel and appellate counsel for large and small California employers in litigation (and arbitration) ranging from individual discrimination and harassment claims to complex wage and hour representative and class actions. She also leads the firm’s appellate practice, having substantial experience and success handling appeals, writ petitions, and amicus briefs in both state and federal court on issues such as class certification (particularly in the wage and hour arena), manageability and due process concerns associated with class action trials, exempt/non-exempt misclassification issues, meal and rest break compliance, trade secret/unfair competition matters, and the scope of federal court jurisdiction under the Class Action Fairness Act.> Contact> Full Bio Call 916.361.0991